Chapter 46

SOLAR LEADERS REACH ACCORD TRANS-SOLAR NEWS SERVICE FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE FLASH: SYSTEM-WIDE Filed at Solar Conference Site

The meeting of the Solar System’s Heads of State is a success. President Camari of the UIPS opened the proceedings with a brief speech. Ignoring past differences, he emphasized common interests, interdependence of peoples and nations, and benefits through collective efforts to meet the needs of the dispersed communities of humankind.

“The singular authority of the old United Planetary System,” Camari said, “had no need for means to resolve issues among separate nation-states. That is no longer true. We must provide for interregional and international deliberations and decision-making. Furthermore, our diminished reserves of metals, minerals and other essential substances, on the one hand, and the benefits of an operational Slingshot, on the other, creates new challenges of common concern and more options in the search for solutions. Unless we accelerate our collaboration to resolve the resources crisis our civilizations may well erupt once more toward potential disasters such as the one we are here trying to escape.”

Following President Camari’s opening remarks, the conference was addressed by INOR Chiefs of State. Each expressed the aspirations of his or her people and their capabilities toward attainment. All agreed that their meeting was timely, that the problems were mutual, and that the agenda be addressed without delay.

The exchanges were intense as the conferees sought a balance between inalienable rights and solemn obligations. Many issues were extremely complex: What are an inhabited planet’s or satellite’s jurisdictional limits within territorial and contiguous space? What are the rights and obligations of one Region’s military and commercial vessels and citizens when inside the lawful boundaries of another? What is the definition of “innocent passage” in the context of a multi-national Solar Community? How are our dynamic and constantly changing interplanetary and interregional space lanes to be maintained? Who will pay for such services? Questions posed in one context were injected into others or phrased to highlight a wide range of diverse interests and nuances.

Discussions among the primary conferees were, at times, suspended for caucuses of Heads of States orbiting a central planet with their advisors. Ad hoc committees were set up to explore options in depth, or at minimum, to provide clarity and context to the issue. The meeting rooms along the periphery of the assembly hall filled with specialists who argued loudly, in whispers, and at length.

Often, additional data was needed from Seats of Government. The spunnel communications channels were loaded with traffic, and archives throughout the system opened, many for the first time in millennia. The Conference Disk’s computers absorbed facts and expert opinions and spewed distillations of new conclusions.

Slowly, positions clarified and consensus took form.

A draft Declaration of Principles emerged from the back rooms. It dealt with only a few of many problems that needed immediate attention, leaving a broad array of issues open for further review.

After hours of debate the Draft Declaration of Principles was approved by the Leaders of the Solar Community. (See Appendix.)

All agreed that the First UIPS-INOR Conference augured well for the future of humankind.

Epilogue

The networks of mass attractors that tethered the Extractor to Planet Pluto disengaged nine Earth centuries after construction began. Pluto contributed its orbital momentum to the launch. In time the integrated drives of the most advanced propulsion thrusters took on the full load, and the dream of humankind was on its way to the Alpha Centauri star system, on schedule.